As Cincinnati Archbishop Dennis Schnurr and other Catholic officials speak out publicly against a new federal rule involving free birth control, the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) defends the switch and says the criticism is misguided.

Last month the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) announced that the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act — known informally as “ObamaCare” — would require nearly universal coverage of contraception.

Christians, Muslims, Jews come together to support marriage equality

Some of Cincinnati’s religious leaders gathered at a press conference today to endorse the Freedom to Marry and Religious Freedom Amendment, an amendment from FreedomOhio that would legalize same-sex marriage in the state.

Pastor Mike Underhill of the Nexus United Church of Christ
(UCC) in Butler County, Rabbi Miriam Terlinchamp of Temple Sholom,
Pamela Taylor of Muslims for Progressive Values and
Mike Moroski, who recently lost his job as assistant principal at Purcell Marian High School for
standing up for LGBT rights (“Testing Faith,” issue of Feb. 13), all took part in the event — showcasing a diversity of
religious support for marriage equality.

In a statement, Underhill said UCC was the first major Christian denomination to embrace marriage equality. He added, “All people have the right to lead lives that express love, justice, mutuality, commitment, consent and pleasure.”

The sentiment was echoed by the other religious leaders.
Moroski said in a statement, “I’m
elated to stand here today with these wonderful faith leaders, who
truly, deeply and spiritually believe that two people who love one
another deserve the right to be married.”

FreedomOhio is aiming to get its
amendment on the ballot as soon as November, according to Ian James, the
organization’s co-founder.

“Our balanced amendment gives a loving same-gender couple
the right to marry while respecting a religious institution’s freedom to
choose to recognize and perform that marriage or not,” James said in a
statement.

CityBeat previously covered the Freedom to Marry Ohio amendment and some of its hurdles with other LGBT groups (“The Evolution of Equality,” issue of Nov. 28).

A local music teacher says Cincinnati
Hills Christian Academy offered him a job and then rescinded the
offer after asking him if he is gay. Jonathan Zeng says he went
through the school's extensive interview process, was offered a
position and then called back in for a discussion about religious
questions in his application, during which he was asked directly if
he is gay. Zeng says he asked why such information was pertinent, and
an administrator said it was school policy not to employ teachers who
are gay because they work with children and something about the
sanctity of marriage. When contacted by local media CHCA released the
following statement:

CHCA keeps confidential all matters
discussed within a candidate's interview. We're looking into this
matter, although the initial information we have seen contains
inaccuracies. We will not be discussing individual hiring decisions
or interviews.

As expected, the pay equity bill failed along party lines,
52-47, short of the required 60-vote threshold. But for majority
Democrats, passage wasn't the only point. The debate itself was aimed
at putting Republicans on the defensive on yet another women's issue,
this one overtly economic after a government report showing
slower-than-expected job growth.

"It is incredibly disappointing that in this make-or-break
moment for the middle class, Senate Republicans put partisan politics
ahead of American women and their families," Obama said in a
statement after the vote.

In desperate need to bolster his low popularity numbers, Gov. John Kasich visited Cincinnati Tuesday to praise a deal that allows a local company to expand downtown and add jobs. Dunnhumby USA, a retail branding firm, will move from Third Street to a long vacant site at Fifth and Race streets, where it will build a new complex and add 550 jobs. Dunnhumby is getting the maximum 15 years of state Job Creation tax credits to help with the move.

The head of faculty at Xavier University is questioning the college president's abrupt, unilateral decision to stop offering birth control coverage in insurance for faculty and staff. Shannon Byrne, faculty committee chair, says President Michael J. Graham’s announcement Monday might violate XU's own rules about how such decisions can be made. She is scheduling a meeting April 12 so faculty can discuss the situation and decide how to respond.

ARTIMIS signs are supposed to alert motorists to traffic congestion and missing persons, but area residents have said they've noticed a lot of them don't work. As a result, transportation officials say 29 malfunctioning ARTIMIS signs will be replaced as part of upcoming construction projects on Interstates 471 and 275. All of the upgrades will be completed by July.

A Waynesville High School student is suing the school district for preventing him from wearing a T-shirt to class that depicted a pro-gay message. Maverick Couch wants to wear the shirt, which states “Jesus is not a homophobe,” to school on April 20 to show support for the Day of Silence, a national event that draws attention to the silencing of gay and lesbian students through bullying. School officials, however, initially told Couch the shirt was disruptive and later that it was too religious. Now they allege it violates rules prohibiting clothing that is “sexual in nature,” which Couch's attorney said is “absurd.”

Yahoo! Sports has released the rankings of Major League teams with the most players claimed in fantasy baseball leagues, and some Reds are among the sought-after stars. The Yankees and Rangers tied for the top spot as most popular on Yahoo!. Both teams have 13 players owned in at least 50 percent of Yahoo! Leagues. But the Reds also make a good showing, with seven players owned in at least 50 percent of the fantasy leagues.

In news elsewhere, GOP presidential hopeful Mitt Romney left his rival, Rick Santorum, in the dust Tuesday. Romney won all three primaries that were held — in Wisconsin, Maryland and the District of Columbia — and emerged with substantial gains in delegates.

Despite widespread opinion to the contrary, a private investigator alleges in a new book that O.J. Simpson didn't murder his ex-wife, Nicole Brown Simpson, in 1994. Instead, William C. Dear said his inquiry revealed that O.J. was covering up for the real culprit: Jason Simpson, O.J.'s son from his first marriage. Dear said he discovered a knife in a storage unit that was rented by Jason that he believes is the murder weapon, along with a forged time card from the night of the killings. Dear alleges that Jason Simpson was working as a chef in a Beverly Hills restaurant that day and had put together a special meal for the family. Brown didn't attend, however, angering him. The P.I. said Jason was on probation for assaulting his previous employer with a knife and has spent time in a psychiatric unit.

If you're an evangelical Christian, you might want to skip this next item. A new medical study finds that older adults who say they've had a life-changing religious experience — in other words, are “born again” — are more likely to have a greater decrease in size of the part of the brain critical to learning and memory. Researchers asked 268 people, ages 58 to 84, about their religious affiliation, spiritual practices and life-changing religious experiences. Over the course of two to eight years, changes to the hippocampus were monitored using MRI scans. The researchers suggested that stress over holding religious beliefs that fall outside of the mainstream may help explain the findings. Or they're just stupid.

A major Chinese analyst said the senior leadership of the Chinese government increasingly views the competition between the United States and China as a zero-sum game, and believes the United States is a declining power that is trying to disrupt China's economic and military growth. Wang Jisi revealed his findings in a monograph published this week by the Brookings Institution in Washington, D.C.

Hafiz Saeed, the leader of a Pakistan-based group blamed for the 2008 attacks on Mumbai, has demanded proof after the United States announced a $10 million bounty on his head. In an interview with Al Jazeera, Saeed said the U.S. action was prompted by his organizing rallies against the reopening of military supply lines through Pakistan to NATO forces in Afghanistan.

Cincinnati City Council took the first step Tuesday in repealing the city's ban on owning Pit Bull terriers. Council's Livable Communities Committee voted 5-1 to support repeal, saying it was unfair to single out a specific breed for harsher treatment. Experts have said Pit Bulls aren't inherently vicious, and that their treatment and training by their owners is responsible for any bad behavior. Councilman Cecil Thomas opposed the repeal, stating he was concerned about “enforcement issues.” The full City Council could make a final decision as soon as this afternoon. CityBeatexamined the ban in-depth here.

Police Chief James Craig met Tuesday morning with 19 ministers and community leaders in an Avondale church. Craig wants to create a partnership with clergy to combat youth violence and shootings. It was the second such session that Craig has held this month. Since police presence was increased in Avondale April 2, no more shootings have occurred in the neighborhood.

A Cincinnati police officer was hospitalized after being hurt for the second time on the job. Officer Jerry Enneking has survived four car crashes while on-duty. The 23-year police veteran was rear-ended in a five-car crash Tuesday. Seeing another driver trapped, Enneking ignored his own injuries and helped rescue the person.

Tim Tebow, the prayerful quarterback for the New York Jets, will be in town today for two events at Cincinnati Christian University in Price Hill. The first already is sold out, but there are $500 tickets still available for a banquet. Both events will focus on how Tebow balances his life in the NFL with his faith.

The School for Creative and Performing Arts (SCPA) in Over-the-Rhine is being awarded a $45,000 grant from the National Endowment for the Arts. The SCPA competed with more than 300 other groups for the cash, which will be used to support the school's Master's Artist Series and Artists in Residence programs for the next school year.

In news elsewhere, an ex-drilling engineer for BP Oil has been arrested on charges of intentionally destroying text messages sought by federal authorities as evidence in the wake of the April 2010 Deepwater Horizon oil spill disaster. The charges of obstruction of justice filed against Kurt Mix, in the Eastern District of Louisiana, are the first criminal charges connected to the oil spill. If found guilty, Mix could face up to 20 years in prison and up to $250,000 in fines for each count.

As expected, Willard Mitt Romney swept the five Republican presidential primaries held Tuesday. The former Massachusetts governor got 67.4 percent of the vote in Connecticut, 56.5 percent in Delaware, 62.4 percent in New York, 58 percent in Pennsylvania, and 63.2 percent in Rhode Island. Most of the other GOP contenders have conceded the nomination race to Romney.

During the presidency of George W. Bush, the United States had the worst job creation record in decades, suffered the worst recession since the Great Depression and borrowed billions of dollars from China to support two wars. If you've been wondering how Romney or other Republican politicians running for office would do anything differently, wonder no more. Alexandra Franceschi, a spokeswoman for the Republican National Committee, said in an interview last week that the GOP's economic platform will be the same as that under Bush, just “updated.” There, voters: You have been warned.

A Brooklyn district attorney is resisting a public records request to divulge the names of 85 Orthodox Jews arrested on sex charges there during the past three years. Brooklyn District Attorney Charles Hynes says the "tight-knit" nature of the Orthodox community makes it impossible to disclose the identities of abuse suspects without also identifying their victims. A Jewish newspaper might file a legal challenge to the decision.

Despite numerous cuts to government spending in the name of austerity — or perhaps because of it, if you listen to some economists — the United Kingdom has now officially sunk into a double-dip recession, its first since the 1970s. Economic indicators reveal the U.K. economy has performed even more weakly since the current financial crisis began than in the Great Depression.

To help avoid a $43 million deficit, the Cincinnati Board of Education voted Monday to cut 40 staff positions for next year. The positions affected are central office staff and administrative employees. The board said some teacher layoffs are possible later, but it wants to see how many people plan on retiring after the school year ends.

A retired local judge told WCPO-TV's I-Team that his dismissal from a United Nations tribunal was the result of a “purge” because some U.N. officials disliked the reforms that he and his colleagues were implementing. Mark Painter, who is a former municipal court judge and appellate court judge in the Cincinnati area, served three years as the only American on a new tribunal that makes final judgments on internal United Nations disputes. But the committee that selects judges chose not to renominate him for a full seven-year term. Painter said it's because the tribunal made its decisions binding, but U.N. officials denied the allegation.

About 40 people attended an event Monday night at downtown's Piatt Park to mark Occupy Cincinnati's return to the plaza. As part of a deal signed last week with the city's attorneys, Occupy members are now allowed to remain in the park overnight as long as they are quiet and don't erect tents. Less than 10 people chose to stay until this morning.

In other protest-related news, the Archdiocese of Cincinnati gave permission for a Catholic priest in a Dayton suburb to perform an exorcism outside of a medical clinic that performs abortions. The Rev. Tim Ralston of St. Charles Borromeo Church in Kettering performed the rite Sunday at the Women's Med Center. About 300 anti-abortion activists attended the event.

Gov. John Kasich is trying to force out the leader of the Ohio Republican Party before November's elections. Party Chairman Kevin DeWine announced Sunday he wouldn't seek reelection when his two-year term expires in January, but Kasich wants DeWine gone now. Kasich wants to name his own appointee, and hopes to oust DeWine when the GOP’s newly elected 66-member central committee meets April 13.

In news elsewhere, public outcry has prompted the U.S. Justice Department to launch an investigation into the shooting of a black teenager by a neighborhood watch captain who escaped arrest. More than 435,000 people signed an online petition calling for the arrest of the shooter, George Zimmerman. Trayvon Martin, 17, was unarmed when he was killed Feb. 17 while walking home after buying Skittles and iced tea at a nearby store.

More details are emerging about the past of the Norwood native who is accused of killing 16 Afghan civilians in a shooting spree. Before he enlisted in the Army, Robert Bales' career as a stockbroker came to an end when a court arbitrator ordered Bales and the owner of the firm that employed him to pay $1.4 million for taking part in “fraud” and “unauthorized trading.” The client, Gary Liebschner, a 74-year-old retired engineer, told The Washington Post that he “never got paid a penny” of the award.

Meanwhile, the shooting spree may lead to Afghan President Hamid Karzai winning a major concession from the United States. Officials are mulling whether to modify the use of controversial night raids by troops and giving Afghans more oversight. The Obama administration is discussing options with the Afghans including a warrant-based approach or possibly allowing Afghan judges to review raids before they took place, a U.S. official said Monday.

JP Morgan Chase is closing the Vatican bank's account with its Italian branch based on concerns about a lack of transparency at the Holy See's financial institution. Italian newspapers reported JP Morgan Chase informed the Vatican bank that its account was being closed because it had failed to provide sufficient information on money transfers. The institution has been accused of tax fraud and money laundering in the past.

The man who killed four people at a Jewish school in southwestern France on Monday had a camera around his neck and may have filmed the scene, France's interior minister says. Police have linked the attack to two shootings last week in which three soldiers of North African descent died. The same gun and the same scooter were used in all the attacks, they report. French schools held a moment of silence today to remember the victims.

Media musings from Cincinnati and beyond

• Giovanna Chirri, the veteran Vaticanista who understood
the pope’s Latin, broke the news that he’d just announced his
resignation. She works for the Italian news agency, ANSA. Her skill
recalled Ernest Sackler at Rome’s UPI bureau when I was a
photojournalist stringer during John XXIII’s papacy. Ernest truly
understood Vatican Latin well enough to turn it into flowing English;
colleagues spoke of him with awe.

• I’m grateful to the Enquirer for running a story on Sen.
Rand Paul’s response to the State of the Union Message. It wasn’t on
NPR or any other network that I could find. His Washington office did
not respond to my question of whether the Kentucky Republican offered his
remarks to any broadcasters/cable networks.

• Tens of millions of Americans will become eligible for
subsidized medical care under Obama’s Affordable Care Act. Who’s going
to treat them? I haven’t seen that in the news. And while reporters are
working out that story, ask how the required additional primary care
physicians will pay off college and medical school debts on the salaries
that will be paid to their specialties.

• And once journalists dig into the supply of physicians
to handle Medicaid expansion, I hope they’ll ask who’s going to staff
quality preschool education for every American child. Obama can be
aspirational, but we’re not talking about minimum wage diaper changers.
Early learning centers require trained pre-school educators. And while
they’re at it, reporters should ask where these new early childhood
educators will train and who’s going pick up the tab. After all, they’ll
never repay college loans on day care wages.

• Maybe I missed it in the admiring coverage of our
government killing American Islamists abroad with drone rocket attacks: What prevents Obama from killing Americans in this country with drone
strikes? None of the news stories or commentaries I’ve read or heard
addressed that point.

There would be no shortage of targets. Wouldn’t the
sheriff have loved a drone-launched missile to kill Christopher Dorner,
the rogue ex-LAPD cop? That might have spared the deputy whom Dorner
killed during the flaming finale in the San Bernardino mountains. And
what prevents our increasingly militarized police from using their own
armed drones?

Imagine what authorities could have done with armed drones during earlier, infamous encounters:

A missile fired at armed members of the American Indian
Movement at Wounded Knee, S.D., could have avenged inept, vain
and foolish George Armstrong Custer and FBI agents killed in the 1973
siege.

No feds would have died if a drone-launched missile
incinerated Randy Weaver’s family with during its deadly 1992
confrontation with feds at Ruby Ridge, Idaho.

David Koresh and the Branch Davidian religious sect were
incinerated by the feds’ 1993 armored assault in Texas. That would have
been a perfect photo op for a domestic drone attack.

• Sometimes, “national security” is the rationale for requested or commanded self-censorship, even when secrets aren’t secret.

For instance, British editors held stories about Prince
Harry until he returned the first time from Afghanistan. However, an
Australian women’s magazine reported he was in combat. The non-secret
was a secret because no one paid attention.

More recently, the new U.S. drone base in Saudi Arabia was
supposed to be a secret. Obama officials asked major news media to hold
the story and they agreed. National security, you know.

But it wasn’t a secret. Washington Post blogger Erik
Wemple said Fox News already had reported U.S. plans to build the
facility in Sept. 2011. Three months before that, the Times of
London reported construction of the Saudi drone base.

When the New York Times broke the agreement and reported
the Saudi drone base, everyone jumped on the story. Now, the Times, the
Post and AP are trying to explain why they kept the non-secret from us.

• Gone are the days when senior Israeli government
officials could call in top editors and broadcasters and tell them what
they could not report. Last week, a tsunami of technology overwhelmed
official Israeli efforts to censor the story of Prisoner X. Israeli
journalists were not to report his existence or mention the censorship
order. National security, you know. However, an Australian network named
an Aussie as Prisoner X and said he reportedly committed suicide three
years ago in an Israeli prison. Social media and the online world took
it from there: "Aussie recruited by Israeli spy agency dies in Israeli
prison." Israel dropped efforts to censor the Prisoner X story and is
issuing official statements about the case.

• San Bernardino’s sheriff asked journalists to quit
tweeting from the final gunfight with former LAPD cop Christopher
Dorner. Bizarre. If authorities feared Dorner would gain tactical
information, they misread his situation: Dorner was surrounded in a
mountain cabin, tear gas was being lobbed in and men outside were
trying to shoot him. He probably was too busy to read tweets. Moreover,
only one reporter was close enough to tweet anything remotely useful to
anyone. Most reporters initially or finally ignored the sheriff.

The tweet issue first arose during the 2008 Muslim
terrorist attack on Mumbai when invaded the Taj Mahal Palace Hotel. Some
authorities reportedly feared accomplices outside were reading news
media tweets and forwarding tactical information about police and army
movements to gunmen inside. I don’t remember if anyone asked reporters
to quit tweeting.

• A new poll says Fox hit an alltime low for the four
years Public Policy Polling has tracked trust/distrust among TV
networks: 41 percent trust Fox, 46 percent do not. The poll didn’t find anything for
other networks to brag about. Only PBS had more “trust” than “distrust”
among viewers: 52 percent trust, 29 percent don’t trust. The poll questioned 800
voters by telephone from Jan. 31 to Feb. 3.

• Garry Wills’ new book, Why Priests, sets out to debunk
Catholicism’s dearest dogmas and doctrines concerning priests, bishops
and the papacy. NPR’s Diane Rehm gave him an hour last week to say why
Catholic ordained clergy are an unnecessary accretion. Then she asked an
outgunned parish priest from the Washington, D.C. area for a rebuttal.
If she really wanted a lively, informed argument, there is no shortage
of priest-scholars who could have matched Wills’ credentials and talents
as an historian. It was unfair and cringe-worthy.

• It’s touchy when an unpleasantry is brought up in an
obit: a long forgiven conviction, a “love child,” whatever. More often,
predictably awkward moments are omitted in the spirit of de mortuis nil
nisi bonum. Here’s HuffingtonPost on a full-blown omission in the recent
obit on former New York mayor and mensch Ed Koch:

“The New York Times revised its Friday obituary
. . . after several observers noticed that it lacked any mention of his
controversial record on AIDS. The paper's obituary, written by longtime
staffer Robert D. MacFadden, weighed in at 5,500 words. Yet, in the
first version of the piece, AIDS was mentioned exactly once, in a
passing reference to ‘the scandals and the scourges of crack cocaine,
homelessness and AIDS.’ The Times also prepared a 22-minute video on
Koch's life that did not mention AIDS. This struck many as odd; after
all, Koch presided over the earliest years of AIDS, and spent many years
being targeted
by gay activists who thought he was not doing nearly enough to stop the
spread of the disease. Legendary writer and activist Larry Kramer called Koch ‘a murderer of his own people’ because the mayor was widely known as a closeted gay man.”

• New York’s Ed Koch admired Wall Street Journal reporter
Danny Pearl’s recorded last words before Muslim terrorists beheaded him.
Koch had Pearl’s affirmation of faith engraved on his own tombstone in
Manhattan’s Trinity Church graveyard: “My father is Jewish, my mother is
Jewish, I am Jewish.”

• A former student reporter rarely rates an obit in the
national media, but Annette Buchanan wasn’t ordinary. In the mid-1960s,
she refused a court order to name sources for her story about student
marijuana use on the University of Oregon campus. Her story ran in the
Oregon Daily Emerald, the campus paper. No shield law protected her
promise of confidentiality. The Emerald said she was fined the maximum
$300 and the state supreme court affirmed her contempt of court
conviction. That led to the creation of Oregon’s shield law for
journalists. She died recently.

• An unresolved First Amendment issue is whether bloggers
can be protected by state shield laws that allow journalists to keep
sources secret. The latest case is from New Jersey. Poynter.com
said blogger Tina Renna refused to identify government officials whom
she said misused county generators after Hurricane Sandy. Union County
prosecutors demanded the 16 names, saying Renna wasn’t a journalist
protected by New Jersey’s shield law because she’s been involved in
politics, her blog is biased and she’s often critical of county
government.

The Newark Star-Ledger took her side. It said shield law protection “shouldn’t
hinge on whether someone is a professional, nonpartisan or even
reliable journalist. It’s a functional test: Does Renna gather
information that’s in the public interest and publish it? Yes.” Renna “can
be a little wild, she’s not the same as a professional reporter and she
drives local officials crazy. But part of democracy is putting up with
Tina Renna.” A court will probe whether Renna is a journalist as defined
by the state shield law; that is, whether bloggers can be included by
analogy under protected electronic news media.

• Few ledes — introductory sentences in news stories — are
as lame as those saying the subject “doesn’t look” like some
stereotype. For years, it usually referred to a woman in an
unconventional (read men’s) occupation or pastime. “She didn’t look
like a steelworker . . . “ or, “You wouldn’t think a tiny blonde bagged a
deadly wild boar with a huge .44 magnum revolver.” Male subjects aren’t
immune, as in this lede from a recent Washington Post story: “Farmer
Hugh Bowman hardly looks the part of a revolutionary who stands in the
way of promising new biotech discoveries and threatens Monsanto’s
pursuit of new products . . . ”

What do revolutionaries look like? Lenin was pictured in
suit and tie. Gandhi wore a white, draped sari or dhoti, Mandela and
fellow ANC rebels often wore suits and ties. Young 1960s American and
French student rebels never wore suits and ties and needed haircuts.
Today’s young North African activists dress the same for class or a
demonstration.

“Doesn’t look like” wouldn’t even fit an androgynous male
model in the annual Victoria’s Secret fashion show. He’d be there
because he looks like a classic, young, leggy “angel.”

• Have you noticed how hurricanes, floods, blizzards and
tornadoes are morphing from evidence of climate change into photo ops?
News media see them as so common that little reporting is required
beyond images and stories of hardship: shoppers hoarding sliced white
bread, downed trees and shattered homes, marooned airline passengers and
days without power. Maybe there’s the throwaway quote from some
climatologist about change affecting weather, but for the most part,
that’s it. I’m betting this deliberate ignorance is a Republican Party
plot to show that increasingly frequent, dangerous weather reflects the
Intelligent Design that gave us dino-riding cavemen a few thousand years
ago.

• The Enquirer devoted Page 1 to a dramatic OMG! graphic
and story suggesting Cincinnati was terrible because it had no black
candidate for mayor. An accompanying list of movers and shakers had few
blacks. The presentation suggested the all-white mayoral contest meant
amiss in a city where whites are the largest minority. However, whites
and blacks told reporters that leadership rather than color was foremost
among attributes they sought in a mayor. Moreover, with so many African
Americans in visible leadership roles in the city, having a black mayor
succeed a black mayor was less of an issue than the paper suggested.

Duke Energy is asking state regulators if it can bump customers' rates up again. Duke says the
increases are to pay for infrastructure investments. The change would
increase customer costs of electric service by $86 million and for
natural gas by $44 million. A federal appeals court on Monday reinstated an antitrust lawsuit against Duke Energy that accuses the
company of paying kick-backs to corporations opposing a 2004 rate
increase.

A rally for “religious freedom”
will take place on Fountain Square today in response to federal health care
legislation requiring women to have abortions employers to
provide insurance that covers birth control. The law includes a
religious exemption, which bishops have said isn't enough.

New York City officials, including
Brooklyn Democratic Rep. Yvette Clarke, are arguing that the city's
“Stop and Frisk” policy is racist. The policy allows police to
stop an individual and pat him or her down for contraband if they
suspect illegal activity. From USA Today:

Clarke says the program, known as "Stop, Question and Frisk"
or "Stop and Frisk," amounts to racial profiling. It is
based on a 1968 Supreme Court ruling that police could stop people on
the basis of "reasonable suspicion."

Last month, U.S. District Court Judge Shira Scheindlin approved
class-action status for a lawsuit that alleges the practice subjects
people to race-based illegal searches.

Rick Santorum has formed a new conservative organization aiming to
recruit 1 million supporters to help get Barack Obama out of the
While House. No word on how Santorum's “Patriot Voices” group
will differ from the tea party patriots.

Black members of the Netherlands soccer team were subjected to
racist chants at their Euro 2012 practice facility in Krakow, Poland.
The team says fans were making monkey chants at the players.

LeBron James scored 45 points to lead the
Miami Heat over the Boston Celtics last night, forcing a deciding Game 7 for the
Eastern Conference championship. The Oklahoma Thunder await in the
NBA Finals.

Leave it to The Enquirer to publish a story analyzing local school district spending vs. academic success only to ignore the existence of private schools while drawing the conclusion that “a district that spends more doesn't necessarily produce higher test scores and graduation rates.” The story, titled “Big-spending districts net mixed academic grades,” doesn't include the qualifier “public school” or the possibility that local private schools spend even more per pupil than Indian Hill, Sycamore Township, Mariemont and Norwood, each of which spent $11,958 to $15,209 per student last year and earned Excellent or better ratings.

While anti-urban Cincinnatians gripe over the
twice-approved $95 million streetcar project — some going so far as to
attach anti-funding amendments to federal bills that will never be
included in the final legislation — authorities on the other side of the
river are demonstrating just how little $20 million on transportation
funding can provide. The state will widen KY 237 in Boone County using
elevated ramps to allow for left-hand turns, adding a freeway-style
element to the residential/corridor area. The two-year project will be
paid for using Federal Surface Transportation Program funds.

Starting this fall all students in Newport
Independent Schools will get free breakfast and lunch because the
district is participating in the Community Eligibility Option in
President Obama’s Healthy, Hunger-Free Kids Act of 2010.

For particle physicists, finding the Higgs boson is a key
to confirming the standard model of physics that explains what gives
mass to matter and, by extension, how the universe was formed. …

Rosen compared the results scientists are preparing to
announce Wednesday to finding the fossilized imprint of a dinosaur: “You
see the footprints and the shadow of the object, but you don’t actually
see it.”

Spain won the 2012 European Championship soccer tournament on Sunday with a
4-0 victory over Italy. The Spanish team is being considered one of the
greatest ever, as it has won three straight major tournaments, including
the 2010 World Cup and 2008 Euro.